Newspaper Page Text
8A
♦ TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 1, 2005
STORM
From page 1A
the hardest hit in the service
area.
“The worst areas were the
more rural ones like Talbot
County,” she said. “We still
have about 1,500 residences
without power all through
the service area. Houston
County was luckier in that it
is not as rural and a lot of
the lines there are under
ground ones. The residences
still without power in
Houston County are isolated
outages scattered through
out the county.
Flint Energies reported
that in an effort to get the
greatest number of homes
back on as soon as possible,
service to substations, pri
mary lines, and then second
ary lines have been the pri
ority for the line crews. Most
of Flint’s primary circuits
have been repaired and the
attention has been focused
on hundreds of individual
services. In many cases, the
member sees power restored
to their neighbors’ homes
without seeing their own.
This occurs because an indi
vidual outage is preventing
electricity from reaching a
small group of homes served
by a single transformer or
switch. Members are
encouraged to call Flint’s
outage line again if they
think they are part of an
individual outage.
Pearce said that Flint
Energies works continuous
ly to keep tree limbs rimmed
back from power lines but
there is only so much they
can do.
“We had hoped that the
hurricane back in
September had done a good
enough job in taking care of
those tree limbs, but some
how Mother Nature will find
a way to get one on a power
line,” she said.
“We are continuously
doing right-of-way work but
it is an individual’s duty to
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Th/s was f/ie scene created by the ice in the landscape behind Ace Hardware in Perry.
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Icicles form a short skirt on a patio table Saturday.
keep the tree limbs in their
yard away from the power
line. We give people guid
ance on planting trees and
keeping them away from
lines and transformers, but
they do not always listen.”
Houston County Fire
Chief Jimmy Williams
manned the E-911 Center
over the weekend along with
Cpl. Gloria Williams and he
said they had a busy time.
“There were a bunch of
calls of power lines down
and people without electrici
ty,” Williams said. “There
were no major events relat
ed to the storm and no
house fires that I can recall.
We were monitoring things
here from the E-911 center
all weekend starting
Saturday morning.”
Williams said that things
had pretty well gotten
cleared up by Monday morn
ing.
“Flint hopes to get things
back on line today,” he said.
“I know they have all of
their crews assigned as well
as having an additional 14
crews on call Friday morn
ing.”
Flint also had additional
line crews from Sumter
EMC, Cobb EMC, Jackson
EMC and Colquitt EMC to
help in the restoration
process.
Williams did have a cau
tionary word for people call
ing E-911.
“People need to know that
E-911 is for emergencies,”
Williams said. “They need to
call that if they have a house
fire or other emergency, not
for power outages. Georgia
Power and Flint Energies
have widely published num
bers to call to report power
outages. You do not need to
call E-911. We cannot help
you get your power back on
and it only clogs the lines
and makes things harder for
us to handle true emergen
cies.
submitted Mike Brennan
A wintry scene off Perimeter Road in Perry following Friday night’s ice storm.
“People need to be patient
when something like this
happens and work together
to make things right,”
Williams said.
E-911 Manager Ricky
Harlowe repeated Williams’
words.
“If it is not an immediate
threat, try not to call the
emergency number because
it could affect our ability to
handle a real emergency,”
Harlowe said. “We got hun
dreds and hundreds of calls
about power outages and
while we were able to steer
them to someone who could
help them, it is not really
our job.”
It was reported that a
school bus had encountered
LOCAL
a downed electrical line
Monday morning but Pearce
reported that it was a false
alarm.
“It was an individual serv
ice line that had fallen on
the road,” Pearce said. “It
was not energized and the
bus ran under it. The chil
dren were never in any dan
ger.
The incident occurred on
Davidson Road off Ga. 247.
Beth Burris, Houston
County Board of Education
director of school and com
munity affairs, gave some
further information on the
incident.
“The bus driver said that
her bus was under the line
before she saw it and decid-
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ed to drive on rather than
stop with the line on the
bus,” Burris said. “She said
that she was unable to get
back onto Highway 247
without touching the line
again so she waited until a
crew from Flint Energies
could come out and clear
away the line.”
Burris reported that the
bus carried students to
Bonaire Middle School and
Warner Robins High School.
Pearce said that, although
the line in question was not
energized and was not a
threat, people should keep
far away from any downed
lines.
“Downed power lines can
kill you if they are ener
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THE HOUSTON HOME JOURNAL
gized,” she said. “There is
no good way to tell if they
are energized just by looking
at them so the best thing to
do is to steer clear and let
professionals deal with
them.”
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